Statement released in advance of Senate hearing this Tuesday

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS)
and a coalition of Jewish and other faith organizations and leaders
from across the religious and political spectrum issued an “Interfaith
Statement in Support of Comprehensive Immigration Reform.”

With immigration reform and undocumented migration hot-button issues in
Washington and around the United States, the faith community is calling
on government leaders in the Administration and Congress, to come
together in a bipartisan manner to address this pressing national
problem.

Specifically, the statement urges creation of a reform proposal that includes the following:
• An opportunity for hard-working immigrants who are already
contributing to this country to come out of the shadows, regularize
their status upon satisfaction of reasonable criteria and, over time,
pursue an option to become lawful permanent residents and eventually
United States citizens;

• Reforms in our family-based immigration system to significantly
reduce waiting times for separated families who currently wait many
years to be reunited;

• The creation of legal avenues for workers and their families who wish
to migrate to the U.S. to enter our country and work in a safe, legal,
and orderly manner with their rights fully protected; and

• Border protection policies that are consistent with humanitarian
values and with the need to treat all individuals with respect, while
allowing the authorities to carry out the critical task of identifying
and preventing entry of terrorists and dangerous criminals, as well as
pursuing the legitimate task of implementing American immigration
policy.

National and local Jewish groups that joined HIAS and 1986 Nobel
Laureate Elie Wiesel in endorsing the statement, include: United Jewish
Communities, UJA-Federation of New York, Anti-Defamation League,
American Jewish Committee, American Jewish Congress, B’nai B’rith
International, Jewish Council for Public Affairs, Jewish
Reconstructionist Federation, National Council of Jewish Women, Union
for Reform Judaism, , Women’s League for Conservative Judaism,
Baltimore Jewish Council, Community Relations Council of the Jewish
Federation of San Antonio, HIAS and Council Migration Services of
Philadelphia, Jewish Community Action, St. Paul, Minnesota, Jewish
Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation of Southern
Arizona, Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty, New York.

“The reality of today’s broken immigration system is one of tremendous
suffering - including the deaths of over 450 men, women and children
who died crossing the border this year alone who simply are seeking an
opportunity to support their families,” says Gideon Aronoff, vice
president for government relations and public policy at HIAS. “It is
also one of chaos and lawlessness on the border and an unrealistic and
unworkable immigration process that undermines the rule of law and
wastes crucial enforcement resources chasing immigrant workers rather
than focusing on crime and terrorism. For both security and
humanitarian reasons, now is the time to act.”

In addition to faith-based and community organizations, political
leaders at the national, state and local levels have been engaged in
developing plans to address undocumented migration and to achieve
Comprehensive Immigration Reform. Among the leaders who have raised the
necessity of solving this problem are President George W. Bush;
Senators John McCain (R-Ariz.), Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.), John Cornyn
(R-Texas) and Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.); Representatives Jim Kolbe (R-Ariz.),
Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) and Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.); and Governors Bill
Richardson (D-N.M.), Janet Napolitano (D-Ariz.), Arnold Schwarzenegger
(R-Calif.) and Rick Perry (R-Texas).

“We applaud all of these leaders for engaging this difficult issue,”
says Aronoff. HIAS also supports the Secure America and Orderly
Immigration Act of 2005 as a particularly strong foundation for
Comprehensive Immigration Reform and the most promising expression of
the principles contained in the interfaith statement, notes Aronoff.

“Tuesday’s hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee, under the
leadership of Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Penn.), is going to be an
important opportunity to move Comprehensive Immigration Reform forward,
and to help craft the kind of bipartisan consensus that will be needed
to achieve real reform,” Aronoff says.

Thirty-six national organizations, 67 local groups and 31 individual
religious leaders have endorsed the Statement in Support of
Comprehensive Immigration Reform. The statement, which follows, remains
open for endorsement.